• Dominic Monaghan
(Merry from “Lord Of The Rings” & Charlie from “Lost”)

• Peter Mayhew
(Chewbecca from “Star Wars”)

• Dave Prowse
(Darth Vader from “Star Wars”)

Two quick notes before we get started...

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With that being said, let’s get started, shall we?

Whenever I sit down to start writing one of these
mammoth reviews, the struggle kicks in almost immediately, as the hardest part
of these reviews for me is the very beginning. How do you set the tone for the
20+ pages to come (excluding pictures!)? How do you capture the magic, wonder,
excitement, and adrenaline-fuelled fangasms of a convention with mere words?
Sometimes that task can be daunting, especially if the convention didn’t live
up to your expectations. I’ve been doing these reviews for a long time now and
over the course of this journey I’ve had to be very blunt and very negative
towards most convention companies at one time or another, which can leave me in
an awkward situation as many convention owners and crew members are friends of
mine by this point. On those occasions, things can get a little awkward for me,
even if I feel my points are absolutely true and are a necessary part of the
objective reviewing process. Other times, when the moon and the stars align, a
convention will go so seamlessly that you have very little to complain about or
highlight as a negative within the review. Usually such reviews are reserved
for fandom-specific weekend conventions such as those that Starfury organise or
the unparalleled “Wales Comic Con” franchise, who I still maintain do the
greatest comic conventions in the United Kingdom by some margin. However, after
having some issues with both the 2014 and2015 editions of the “London Film
& Comic Con – Summer”, I’m pleased to report that the 2016 event was significantly better than it’s been
since 2013.

Don’t get me wrong, an event on the scale of this
magnitude will never be the best convention ever for me, simply because I love getting to know the guests,
spending time with them, and talking to them at the autograph table for more
than 60 seconds. ‘LFCC’ is such a large franchise by this point that the queues
will always be long, your time with the guests will always be limited. Yet,
that’s not to say that you can’t have an amazing time. I’m a glass half-full
kind of guy, so I always go in with realistic expectations and anything above
and beyond that is a bonus. Thankfully, there were some damn good bonuses at
this event.

I must note that this review largely comes from my
own personal perspective of the convention. While I think this event was very,
very well organised and crewed, others may disagree, which is totally cool with
me. We all have our own unique versions of the experience and I’d love to read
about your own personal views in the comments section at the end of this review
or on social media, so don’t be afraid to get in touch! Speaking of, before
getting into the meat of this review, I would like to thank all the attendees
at LFCC that came over and said “hi” to me or offered words of love and support
about the blog and my reviews. With all three days combined, more than 50
people talked to me about the reviews, which was a very humbling, appreciated
experience. In fact, I had a young female approach me to say that she flew over
from China(!!!) for LFCC because she read my reviews of the previous events and
just had to come. How incredible is
that?!

Now, I know that some people had issues with the
convention, front and centre amongst them were the gold pass holders. One of
the perks of buying a gold pass is that you get let into the convention 10
minutes before regular attendees. This gives you a chance to get your bearings,
figure out where things are, and get any virtual queuing tickets you need for
‘diamond guests’. In essence, a diamond guest is basically an A-List celebrity
that’s going to be very popular over the weekend. Gold ticket holders don’t
need virtual queuing tickets for any of the guests in attendance except the
diamond guests, whereas regular ticket holders need virtual queuing tickets for
everyone who’s operating under the virtual queuing system. Therefore, the gold
ticket holders rely on those 10 minutes to get low virtual queuing numbers for
the diamond guests. Obviously, human beings can only sign so many autographs in
a day, so once you start getting into the 200-300 range, you run the risk of
not getting the autograph you want. Gold ticket holders pay a lot of money for their golden
wristband of dreams and as such are rewarded with queue jumping abilities and
the honour of being let in early, eliminating a certain amount of apprehension
and stress. On Saturday, gold ticket holders were let in at the same time as
regular ticket holders. Even as a regular ticket holder, I know that’s very
unfair. When you take into account that regular ticket holders were closer to
the guests than gold ticket holders, the result was such that gold ticket
holders had V.Q.’s in the hundreds, while my Jack Gleeson V.Q. was #26. Good
for me, bad and unfair for them. I think the
same thing happened on Sunday too, but I could be wrong. I know it happened on
Saturday, but I’m speculating about Sunday simply because some friends of mine
that were regular ticket holders had virtual queuing numbers for diamond guests
that were within the first 20 numbers, which seems odd if gold ticket holders
were let in first.

Alas, from my personal perspective, this event was terrific.
Unlike the last two years where there was barely room to move your arms, this
year had ample space. Certainly more space than I was expecting. Don’t get me
wrong, on Saturday afternoon you wouldn’t want to stand still and swing your
arms in a circle, but you could cross the hall and wander around the stalls
without getting someone’s armpit hair tickling your nostrils. The only time I
felt remotely claustrophobic was
around the “Game Of Thrones” guests on Saturday morning, which I think was down
to the guests being more popular than Showmasters anticipated. Even guests that
appeared in just a couple of episodes had very long queues on Saturday morning.
As you had two rows of “Game Of Thrones” guests, with those rows facing each
other, you had queues inside queues, inside queues. It was queueception, I
tells ya! In addition to the extra space, the air-conditioning was working
inside the venue and you could feel it pretty much all weekend regardless of
where you were. The last two years were so cramped that you couldn’t feel it
whatsoever even when it was working and turned on! Space, air conditioning, no
stinky armpit hair in my face...what kind of bizarro world LFCC have I stumbled
in to?! Furthermore, the layout this year was much better too. It still could
use a jiggle, especially with the “Game Of Thrones” guests, but it was vastly improved compared to the last
couple of years. All the guests and photoshoot areas were on the same floor,
which was the first floor in this case. It made running from one photoshoot to
another much easier, as last year you sometimes had to get up or down two or
three flights of stairs to get to your next photoshoot, which was a nightmare. This year it was effortless
to get from shoot to shoot for me, which was made easier by the incredible crew
members and organisation across the board. All my photoshoots ran more or less
on time, with the most late of which starting 7 minutes late. When you consider
the fact that I had 20 studio photos over the 3 days, that’s an incredible
statistic. The crew were phenomenal all weekend too. Not one rude, clueless, or
obnoxious member in the bunch this year! Ironically, when the crew are really
good, they tend to get neglected a little bit when it comes to praise. It’s
like a referee in a sporting event. If they’re great at their job, they get
noticed less because everything went to seamlessly for people, so I’d like to
take the opportunity to thank ALL the
crew. Everybody smiled at the autograph tables, everybody was courteous, and
the crew running the photo areas in particular were invaluable. The experience
of people like Phil, Luke, Stuart, Brendan, and that dude running photo area B
on Sunday (sorry, I don’t know your name!) is impossible to understate,
especially when it comes to queues for people like Jeremy Renner or Mads
Mikkelsen. You know there’s going to be a lot of people, all lingering around
the photo area, slowly shuffling into the white lines that are marked out for
queuing, so you need a strong voice,
a firm hand, and an upbeat attitude to keep everyone entertained and in check.
All 20 of my photoshoots were well organised. Incredible work all around,
ladies and gentlemen. Be proud of yourselves!

After consulting the forums and social media
throughout the weekend and in the days since it’s finished, I see a lot more
positivity and a lot less moaning than the last couple of years, so my
sentiments about the air-conditioning, the space, the crew, and the
organisation are largely echoed across the board. Not that the event was perfect
by any means. I’m sure many people had issues here and there, but as this is
written from my own personal perspective, I have to say that this was the best
organised and my favourite LFCC since 2013.

Myself and my friends Hannah and John (the usual
ragamuffin crew you’ve read about in previous reviews) left Gloucestershire in
the very early hours of Friday morning on the 29th of July. It was
one of those ‘alarm at 3:30am, leaving at 4:30am’ deals, which are always a wee
bit of a nightmare when it comes to your energy levels over the coming three
days. However, it does save an extra night’s hotel fees, which is useful when
it comes to an expensive weekend like LFCC. Unfortunately, I’ve yet to develop
the ability to shit gold, regardless of how often I’ve experimented, so I cut
costs wherever I can at these events. Three people, two beds? Check. Waking up
at 3:30am to save myself £40? Check. Why did we leave so early, you ask?
Because I needed one virtual queuing ticket. Yep, just one. As the kids would
say, ‘FML’.

We arrived at the Olympia at 6:45am and were in the
queue a matter of minutes after that. Unlike last year, the queue was formed at
the west entrance for regular ticket holders and soon after we arrived everyone
started getting piled into the loading area inside the venue itself. While this
weekend pretty much had the perfect convention queuing weather (not cold, not
hot, little wind, no rain), it’s good to know that in the future we won’t be
queuing outside for too long if Mother Nature plots against us. Plus, queuing
us inside gave Showmasters the opportunity to play 8 trailers to us on a loop
for 2 hours a day, every day. I’m fairly certain I’m now word-perfect on the
“Star Trek: Beyond” and “Suicide Squad” trailers at the very least. Speaking of
“Suicide Squad”, I can only assume they helped sponsor this year’s LFCC as
there was “Suicide Squad” stuff everywhere.
The trailer, 5 large banners (at least) on the ground floor, all the film-worn
costumes were on display on the first floor...I only hope the film lives up to
the hype, especially after memorising the trailer.

My objectives for Friday were relatively simple for
an LFCC – 6 autographs, 4 studio photos, try to blag one of my Sunday photos on
Friday instead to save myself a clash stress, and have a relaxing look around.
The words ‘LFCC’ and ‘relaxing’ have not been in the same sentence for years
unless ‘is not’ is shoved between them. With my first photoshoot, Aaron
Stanford, scheduled for 10am in photo area B, it was time to grab my Laurie
Holden virtual queuing ticket before getting my bearings and figuring out where
everybody I needed to meet was located. We were let in bang on 9am, I was up on
the first floor by 9:01am, and I had Laurie’s V.Q. in my hand by 9:02am, #18.
Today was going to be a relaxed day from now, I could feel it. For those of you
unaware, a virtual queuing ticket is exactly like it sounds. It holds your
place in queue for you, while you’re off doing other things. There’s a board at
the front of a guest’s queue telling everyone what V.Q. numbers they’re signing
up to (e.g. 1-40), and you can join the queue any time after your number has been called. For instance, even
though I had number 18, which they were calling by 10am or so, I could go and
get my autograph at 4pm and it wouldn’t make any difference. It’s a great
system as it allows you to do other things while safe in the knowledge that
you’ll likely get your autograph and it allows Showmasters to keep the amount
of people in the queue to a minimum to avoid attendees getting in each other’s
way. Win-win, people.

With my magical virtual queuing ticket in hand...or
random tiny piece of paper, it was time to chill out and look around a little
bit before heading to my first photoshoot. I noticed that both Gail Kim and Ted
DiBiase were not offering table photos, which was a shame as I couldn’t fit
their studio photos into my schedule over the weekend and the sign was
literally the difference between meeting them and not meeting them. No matter,
this saved me £30 and left me with even less to do on Friday. Soon after, I
bumped into Georges Jeanty, comic artist extraordinaire. Georges has been one
of the primary artists for Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Angel’s continuation
comic series, as well as dipping his toe into the “Firefly” pool and a whole
host of other non-Joss Whedon projects too. I’ve met Georges a couple of times
before and he remembered me instantly when I walked past him. He stopped, we
talked for a few minutes about how he’s been, about LFCC, I warned him that the
following day would be twice as busy, we shook hands, and I continued on to my
Aaron Stanford photoshoot. I loved randomly bumping into Georges. I encourage
everyone to go and meet him, he’s a genuinely humble, relaxed, and awesome
human being.

Aaron’s photoshoot went off without a hitch, the
photo turned out great, and Aaron came across as a very friendly and interactive
guest when he complimented me for looking ‘sharp’, shook my hand, looked me in
the eye, and thanked me for coming. All basic manners and relatively common,
but not something that every guest does. Sometimes in a photoshoot environment
these little things can be the difference between a positive experience and a
bitter taste being left in your mouth. Over the course of the weekend, almost every guest was very friendly
during the photoshoots, while people like Edge, Dan Portman, and Natalia Tena
actively turn their body towards you as you approach, shake your hand, make
eye-contact, smile, and make small talk between photos. Very classy of them. In
turn, some guests (well, one...) barely acknowledged your presence, didn’t
thank you, and generally came across like they’d rather be anywhere else in the
world...but more on that later.

Studio photo disclaimer: The pictures of the studio
photos are all pictures of the photos taken off of my crappy phone, hence why
the contrast and colouring looks a little off and why my teeth look insanely
white in some photos. Once the digital versions are released, I’ll swap the
pictures of the photos with the high-quality digital versions...if I remember.

After Aaron’s photo was completed and the printed
copy was firmly in my hands (instant printing is still amazing years later, I
remember the days of waiting hours for your final photoshoot to be ready while
everyone is getting grumpy and wanting to go home), it was time to start on the
autographs. The agenda for the day – Laurie Holden, Kae Alexander, Jamie
Harris, Bob ‘Hardcore’ Holly, Joe Naufahu (he cancelled and just came on
Saturday and Sunday in the end), Ted DiBiase (no posed photo = not going
to bother), and Gail Kim (no posed photo = not going to bother). That
left just four autographs to collect before my next photoshoot at 2:05pm! I had nearly four hours to kill!
Free time at LFCC?! It’s all so new and unsettling.

Kae Alexander: It
was my first autograph and conversation of the weekend, while also being Kae’s
first day at her first convention. A lot of firsts in this one. Considering it
was her first convention and she hadn’t had a lot of time to warm up yet so
early in the day, Kae was very, very pleasant and talkative. She just has this
relaxing aura around her that makes you chill out and settle into your groove,
which is exactly what you want with your first guest as it sets the tone for
the rest of the conversations that day. Kae was a big fan of “Game Of Thrones”
before she was cast, so she was ecstatic to get to be a part of the show...even
if it meant undergoing ten hours of
make-up and prosthetics every day to transform into Leaf. For those keeping
score, that’s ten hours in the chair, ten hours of filming, then two hours to
get everything off again. That’s a 22-hour working day. Because of the
intricacy of the facial make-up and prosthetics, Kae didn’t even really get to
sleep while it was all being applied. I told her that I’d have gone mental
after the first couple of days, and joked that I hope they didn’t give her too
many days filming together in a row. She talked about the fun process of
filming in a set that looked like a gigantic dark cave covered in roots and we
had a good laugh about the experience of attending conventions. We were both
disappointed by her death on the show, but agreed that if you’re going to go out,
it’s a pretty fucking cool way to go. The only downside to this wonderful
experience was that Kae wasn’t offering table photos and her 5-minute
photoshoot (50 people) later in the day was sold out. With my Saturday and
Sunday being too full already, I was a little disheartened that I wouldn’t get
a photo with her, barring her involvement in the group ‘Hold The Door’ photo
the following day. Alas, towards the end of Friday, as people started to thin
out, the sign came down, so I went back over later in the day and asked the
crew member if it was okay to get a picture with Kae as I’d paid for the
autograph earlier in the day, but didn’t ask for a picture as the sign was up.
The lovely crew member said it was okay, Kae said it was okay and was more than
happy to do it, so I ended up getting the picture after all. Thankfully, the
picture turned out well too, as it would have sucked to go to all that effort
to wind up with a picture where I look like a troll that’s just escaped from
under a bridge. A great conversation, a lovely guest, and a table picture, all
for £10. Bargain. Guest Type =
Responder.

“What the feck is a ‘responder’?”

I’m glad you asked, random voice in my head
representing the new people reading one of my reviews. Many years ago, after
attending many conventions, I devised a system whereby to categorise my
experiences with guests and their level of interaction in order to compare the
quality of my experiences across conventions and time. I have O.C.D., shut up.
The following three types were found :-

·The
Responder:
This type of guest is often polite and friendly. If you ask them a question,
they’ll happily answer. If you comment on something, they’ll respond or smile
gratefully. However, they won’t carry the conversation forward, you have to.
These are the most common type of guest, and this is what you expect when
meeting someone at a convention. This is a great category to
be a part of.

·The
Groucho/Big Guest:
There are two aspects to this category. Firstly, you have the groucho. The
groucho is there for monetary purposes or is generally just having a bad day,
or is a bit of an ass. If you meet enough people, one of them is bound to be an
ass! The grouchos aren’t interested in conversations above a few words. They’ll
say ‘hi’ (sometimes they don’t bother with that), sign, say ‘bye’ (sometimes),
and you’re on your merry way. Of course, in certain situations this is relevant
and expected, which brings me to the second part of this category, the big
guest. Some guests are going to be insanely popular. Such as Stan Lee at LFCC
‘14, who had an entire building to himself basically. When you get a huge queue
like that, the guest can’t take a lot of time with everyone. If they did, many
people would go home disappointed at not getting to meet them at all.
Therefore, the convention company and the guest want to get through as many
people as possible. You cannot have a huge guest and expect to get above a
minute with them, which is perfectly fair.

·The
Conversationalist:
This is easily my favourite type of guest. They’ll answer your
questions with a smile, ask you questions in return, and are happy to chat for
an extended period of time (extended = above 2-3 minutes), regardless of where
the conversation leads or how long you’ve been talking. Obviously, there has to
be some cut-off point if there is a queue behind you, but you
leave the experience feeling euphoric and like you gained a lot more than just
the autograph you queued for.

Feel free to let me know
your experiences with guests in the comments! You can even borrow my categories
to label them, as we all love labelling humans, right?

Jamie
Harris: Right after leaving Kae, I moseyed on over to
Jamie. I don’t know what it is about these Marvel Cinematic Universe actors,
but they’re all so fucking lovely! I’ve never had a bad experience with any of
them. Peter Shinkoda was arguably my favourite guest at LFCC last year and has
since gone on to become a friend, J. August Richards is my boy, Jeremy Renner
was phenomenal and exceeded all expectations for everyone all weekend (more on
that later), Hayley Atwell was a sweetheart, and the other 20+ actors I’ve met
from the franchise have been equally as terrific. Notice how I wrote ‘Marvel
Cinematic Universe’ and not ‘Marvel’, as one particular “X-Men” actress rubbed
a lot of people the wrong way over
this weekend’s LFCC event, which I’ll get into a little later on. I primarily
know Jamie from his role as Gordon during the second season of “Agents Of
SHIELD”, during which Jaime was fantastic. Seriously, if you started SHIELD and
gave up after the first few episodes, stick with it. From two-thirds of the way
through season one onwards, the show has been a very high quality and has
really grown into something great. As part of his role as Gordon, Jamie also
had to wear make-up and prosthetics, just like Kae. The only difference is that
Jamie’s took 2-3 hours, which is still longer than I’d want to sit still, quite
frankly. Jamie said that the process was so exasperating that he started
smoking again just to give himself something to do, which echoes the sentiments
of Jim Carrey, who had to have special training from the army in how to
withstand torture because it was so traumatising to put the Grinch make-up and
hair on every day. That’s some dedication to your craft, ladies and gentlemen.
However, Jamie said he felt as though he couldn’t complain too much as Ruth
Negga (Raina) had to sit there for five hours, which led us to talking about
how amazing Raina’s prosthetics were. The contact lenses and quills looked
amazing. We talked about the show, we talked about conventions, and we talked
about Gordon, before I thanked him immensely for his time and for coming. Even
got a picture at the autograph table too! Jamie was definitely my favourite
conversation of the day and he came across as such as genuinely nice and
appreciative guy that I couldn’t help but leave feeling happy with the
experience. That’s two LFCC’s in a row where my favourite guest on the Friday
was from an MCU television show. Love those guys!Guest
Type = Conversationalist.

Historically,
I’ve been very harsh on Showmasters at times where I thought it was necessary,
but we’ve got to give the devils their due here. Not only was this event very
well organised and conducted, but I love the fact that Showmasters don’t allow
guests to charge for selfies at the autograph table....side note, I hate the
word ‘selfie’. Over the past year or so, selfie charges have burst onto the
U.K. convention scene, with guests charging up to £30(!!) for the privilege of getting a picture with them on your
mobile phone, which seems extortionate to me personally. £5 is one thing, but
£30 is ridiculous. Showmasters won’t allow selfie charges at all and have
recently said publically that they don’t intend to change this moving forwards,
which is admirable and helps me save some money. To be honest, I think if
you’re getting the autograph, the picture should be free. You’ve already dropped
money down, it takes a matter of seconds to take the picture, and if the guest
doesn’t like taking pictures, just put the ‘no posed photos’ sign up. No
worries! I only agree with the selfie charge when people want a picture without
buying an autograph or paying for anything, as it’s pretty cheeky, even when
the guest’s autograph line is empty, as other people have had to pay for the
privilege....all of this is just my opinion, of course.

Bob
‘Hardcore’ Holly: Now, I actually met Bob at Showmasters’ Cardiff
Comic Con event in March of 2015. I got his autograph, bought his autobiography
off him (great read!), which he also signed, and I got a picture with him at
the autograph table. It was a nice experience. Alas, the picture turned out a
little...well, frankly, it blew and sucked at the same time, which is how
people become dizzy. The lighting was bad, the picture came out blurry, and I
looked like a moron even if those first two things weren’t already working against
me. Therefore, I wanted a better picture with Bob, plus I wanted to talk to him
about his autobiography. Both of these things were achievable. If I hadn’t met
Jamie, Bob would have been my favourite guest of the day for sure. Like the
last time I met him, Bob was very courteous, very talkative, and came across
like a genuinely appreciative and nice man, which is stark contrast to the
wrestling persona he portrayed on television for so many years. I reminded Bob
that I met him the year before and bought his autobiography off of him, and I
happened to mention that it was a totally unique read. Most wrestling books
follow a very specific pattern – had a dream, grew up a fan, started training,
setbacks, got better, setbacks, worked their way up the card, obstacles, world
champion, lots of money, retired happy and fulfilled. Bob’s was entirely
different. Bob was always a very good wrestler, but never made it past the
middle of the card. He was never world champion, I don’t believe he ever won a
strong single’s title except the gimmicky Hardcore Championship, but he was a
WWE employee for over 15 years, giving him a lot of stories to tell and a lot
of wrestling history to cover. During the course of the book he was very
honest, very open, and very opinionated, which made for an excellent read. Bob
had a reputation online as being a bully, as he roughed up one of the
competitors in Tough Enough III in 2001, a reality television programme where
the winners received a WWE (then WWF) contract. Bob didn’t like the way they
were all goofing around when given this golden opportunity, so he just beat the
shit out of the first person he stepped into the ring with, who happened to be
my friend of sorts, Matt Cappotelli. I’ve spoken to Matt many times privately
on social media, as we both have very similar stories when it comes to our
wrestling careers, so I held a little bit of a grudge against Bob for a long
time over this. However, seeing the story objectively from Bob’s side, I can
understand it now. Bob’s pretty much retired from wrestling these days, so he
gets to spend his time hiking, touring, and guest training. He’s supposed to be
guest training at Al Snow’s wrestling academy in London this week, but Al’s
academy presently has major water damage so it might not happen. Bob’s a very
interesting man with some very strong opinions on certain areas of the
wrestling business, which makes for a fascinating conversation. I’d definitely
recommend you meet him if you get the chance. Got a table photo too! Guest Type = Conversationalist.

One
thing that surprised me over LFCC weekend was the amount of guests doing table
pictures. I tend to plan my studio photos around the people that I’m certain
won’t be doing table photos (or if I love them too much to resist), yet I was
pleasantly surprised to find that almost everyone
was doing them at one point or another! Even people I thought for certain
wouldn’t be, such as Elden Henson, Edge, Paul McGann, and Donald Sumpter. Out
of the 16 autographs I got over the weekend, only two weren’t doing table
pictures – Natalia Tena (who’d only just arrived
and had a huge queue) and Laurie Holden. I didn’t get one with Jack Gleeson
either, but I’m told by other people that he was doing them at certain points
of the weekend. I managed to get a table picture with the other 13 guests!
Awesome!

Laurie
Holden: Hmmm....not really sure what to think of Laurie. I
got the distinct impression that she decided she didn’t like me much before I
said anything other than “hi”. I said “hi”, she looked up, stared at me for a
full three seconds, then said “...hi...”. After the briefest conversation about
“The Walking Dead” and the shock at Andrea’s death, especially as the character
is still alive in the comics, I thanked her for her time and said goodbye. She
looked up at me, she was smiling granted, but behind the smile there was a look
that said, “please leave already”, so I did. The whole thing must have been a
minute in total, but it left a bizarrely sour taste in my mouth. Ironically,
everything else I’ve read about her all weekend was largely positive. She got
another batch added to her Sunday photoshoot even though it was sold out
because she didn’t want people missing out (or, being cynical, she wanted more
money), a lot of people had great experiences with her on the forums, it just
seems as though she had a random dislike of me instantly. Alllllllrighty then.
To be fair, she was nice to me in the photoshoot, so perhaps she was just
having a grumpy 5 minutes at the time I got to the front of the queue. I think
I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt on this one, but it was my only
autograph signing conversation all weekend that left me feeling flat. Guest Type = Responder (Barely).

Hmpf.

Dave
Prowse: To get that bitter taste out of my mouth, I
decided to go meet Dave Prowse as I had some money left over from not meeting
Ted DiBiase and Gail Kim. I’d actually met Dave once before, but I never got
around to getting a photo with him even though we’ve been to 12 conventions
together by my reckoning. Dave was offering table photos at LFCC, so I decided
to go and grab an autograph and get a picture with him. Dave was his usual
friendly self. There’s a reason why Dave does so many of these and yet still
always has a decent sized queue. It’s because he’s a very nice man and a
legend. Sure, he’s not the type to have 5 or 10 minute conversations these
days, but he’ll happily talk to you and get stuck into a discussion. I finally got the picture I’d been
intending to for years and it came out great too! Definitely made up for the
bizarre interaction with Laurie a few minutes earlier. Thank you, Mr. Prowse,
for restoring my good mood. Dave even offered Hannah, who was acting as my
table photo photographer for the weekend, a picture with him as well, which was
a very rare and classy thing to do. Over the years, Hannah has blagged some
free table pictures with guests I’m meeting (Nick Frost, Finn Jones, and Gethin
Anthony instantly spring to mind), but I believe this was the first time
someone offered it. Very cool. The
last time (which was also the first) I met Dave, he was on crutches, his ankle
was broken, and he wasn’t in the best of moods, which is understandable as
sometimes people have off days, but this interaction more than made up for
that. My only spontaneous purchase of the weekend turned out to be a very good
one from a conversation and picture standpoint. Just goes to show you don’t
need to be a conversationalist or particularly talkative to leave people feeling
happy. Others should take note...do I sound bitter? I sound bitter, don’t I? Guest Type = Responder.

With
all five of my autographs completed and still two and a half hours until my
next photoshoot, it was time to do something unexpected at LFCC. Something
miraculous. Something shocking....eat. That’s right! All 3 of us went next door
to Pizza Express, sat down, had a meal, and relaxed. WHAT. THE. FUCK. This doesn’t happen at LFCC. Not for me anyway. I
was so confused. I almost asked our waitress for an autograph just to make the
situation feel a little more familiar. What a bizarre day this was turning into....two
scheduled autographs I decided against, one I spontaneously got, one awkward
experience, and time to eat...most peculiar.

As
most convention attendees are aware, the photoshoots are largely an experience
of one and the same. They all follow a very specific pattern. Queue, enter,
“hi”, smile, picture is taken, “thank you”, collect it, leave. So there’s very
little to write about when it comes to photos, so I’ll largely just point out
anything abnormal that happened and leave everything else unsaid. My 2:05pm
photoshoot with Peter Mayhew in photo area A went very smoothly, as did my
3:05pm photoshoot with Mads Mikkelsen, who was clearly having a great time all
weekend. I’ve heard so much positive feedback about Mads since the event
finished. He was surprisingly doing table photos on Friday as there were less
people around, he was really going for it with poses in the photo sessions, and
he was having conversations with people as opposed to a few words at the
autograph table. Very impressed with Mads. Both photoshoots turned out great
too.

Next
up was the trickier part. Showmasters have a strict rule about not changing
your photo day. If you buy a photo for Sunday, you have it on Sunday. However,
after the schedule was announced, I realised that my Sunday was going to have a
particularly painful section in the middle of the day, which would be eased
significantly if I could get Laurie’s photo on Friday instead. I saw it as a
win-win situation for both myself and Showmasters. Friday is their least busy
day, so it would be one less photo to get through on Sunday, plus there was a
few minutes left at the end of Laurie’s allotted photo session time on Friday.
I joined the very back of the queue, made sure there was still a few minutes
left in Laurie’s photo schedule (I wouldn’t have tried if they were running
late), and went for it. When the ticket was scanned, it obviously beeped that
it was a Sunday ticket. The lovely crew member looked to Phil (who was in
charge of photo A on Friday), Phil joked with me about always being the
troublemaker, said it was fine, and they manually changed the ticket to a
Friday one on their hand-held scanner. Everybody wins. Thanks, Phil! That made
Sunday a lot easier. It meant that I
could actually sit down briefly and drink something on Sunday instead of
running around from photo area to photo area.

Soon
after Laurie’s shoot it was time for Sean Maher’s, which was to be my last
activity of the day at 4:30pm. I met Sean at “Wales Comic Con” in early 2015
and he’s a lovely, lovely man. I think if anything he’s a little shy, but he
just comes across as so warm and caring. Alas, my photoshoot from that WCC
event turned out badly. The photographer was great, Sean looked amazing, but I
looked like something had just been inserted into my anus and one half of my
face liked it, while the other half was in pain. It left me pouty for a long
time as Sean had already cancelled on me twice before so I didn’t know if I’d
ever get the opportunity again. Thankfully, Sean came to LFCC and didn’t
cancel, so I just had to get a better
photo. Out of the 33 photos I had taken over LFCC weekend (20 studio, 13
phone), my studio with Sean might be my very favourite. It’s certainly in the
top 5, and it was made all the more special by the fact that my first turned
out badly and because Sean remembered me from almost 18 months earlier! Yay!
So, kiddies, if any of your photos turned out badly over LFCC weekend, stay
positive. I’ve had over 500 taken at conventions by this point and even to this
day I occasionally get one that looks awful. It’s as though my face
occasionally forgets how to behave like a face, even with all the experience
I’ve got under my belt.

After
taking some time to check out the merchandise stalls and buying a beautiful
Natalia Tena (Tonks) art print to get signed the next day, it was time to park
the car somewhere and then walk to the Premier Inn, where we had to sneak one
of us in. The room was in my name and I gave John’s name as the other guests.
It was a twin room, so I figured I’d give John’s name instead of Hannah’s. The
staff obviously saw the three of us together later in the evening in the
restaurant, so I can only presume they thought one of us had bought a hooker
for the night (sorry, Hannah). Hannah also pointed out the next day that I
should have given her name as the other guest to explain the female clothing in
the room when it was cleaned. So, ladies and gentlemen, the Premier Inn in
Kensington thinks I am a cross-dressing man who picks up hookers, which isn’t
helped by the fact I naturally wear eyeliner. Still, plus side, there was no
used condom in the wardrobe like in the house share from last year, so there
was no salty violation creeping up my nostrils during the night. I’m a silver
lining kind of guy.

A
5:00am alarm came and brought with it an ecstatic Shangel, a broody John, and a
sleep deprived Hannah. With me acting as military commander, we were out of the
room and heading towards the venue by 5:40am, as I had specific demands to be
in the queue by 6:00am. I needed to get 10 autographs on Saturday, some of
which were going to be tricky...or so I thought. Jack Gleeson, Natalia Tena,
Edge, and Elden Henson would surely be virtually queuing, so I needed low
numbers to be in with a chance. Especially with Jack, as the gold pass holders
would be let in first and take all the low V.Q. numbers. As I mentioned before,
this didn’t happen, but I didn’t know that at the time. We were about 40th
in queue and by 6:45am we were being queued up inside the building. Hannah read
a book on her kindle, while me and John watched “Doctor Who” on my phone.
“Tooth And Claw”, for those of you that are interested. Three “Game Of Thrones”
cast in that episode, which helped to get me in the mood for 7 “Game Of
Thrones” autographs later in the day. Queuing, once again, went pretty
smoothly. We had to move at one point as the hall was filling up, so another
couple of rows were added to the front. The same 8 trailers were playing all
morning again. I was getting a distinct sense of déjà vu already. Unlike the
relatively calm previous day, my schedule was busier on Saturday. 10 autographs
(Jack Gleeson, Natalia Tena, Elden Henson, Edge, Richard Brake, Anton Lesser, Faye
Marsay, Sam Coleman, Paul McGann, and Joe Naufahu) and 6 studio photos (Jack
Gleeson with the Iron Throne, ‘Hold The Door’ group, Jeremy Renner, Edge, Faye
Marsay, and Anton Lesser. With my photoshoots starting at 11:50am with very few
breaks in between lasting longer than 20 minutes, it meant that I had to get
through as many autographs as possible between doors opening at 9:00am and my
first photo at 11:50am. It was theoretically going to be a tough morning, but I
was determined. I had John going up one staircase for me, me and Hannah going
up another, where we’d branch off and grabbed the virtual queuing tickets as
quickly as possible for the guests that I needed them for.

It
turns out that my fears were unnecessary, as we were let in at the same time as
gold ticket holders and we were near the front of the regular ticket holders
queue. Ironically, out of all the virtual queuing tickets we grabbed, I had the
lowest numbers for every single one – Jack Gleeson #26, Elden Henson #14,
Natalia Tena #6, Edge #17. None of the other 6 guests were virtual queuing at
this time, but Faye Marsay and Anton Lesser would be soon afterwards as their
queues got very busy, very quickly as they were only there for one day along
with Sam Coleman. With virtual queuing in place for the big guests, I could
concentrate on the others. I joined Faye Marsay’s queue right before it grew
unexpectedly big. I managed to bounce from Faye to Anton, to Sam without too
much stress, but I do get a little irked when doors open at 9:00am, but most
guests don’t show up until 9:30am or a little later. Don’t Showmasters know I
have a very detailed, specific plan I need to stick to?!

Faye
Marsay: The first thing to note about Faye is that she
looks totally different in real life
than she does in either “Game Of Thrones” or “Doctor Who” (the two things I’ve
seen her in). In real life she has heavy eye make-up, a Northern accent, and is
generally just much more attractive. Faye had to try and get through the
autographs relatively quickly as her queue was ridiculous, but she still took
the time to talk to people as much as possible, which was appreciated.
Unsurprisingly, we talked about “Game of Thrones”, her time on the show, where
she filmed, working with Maisie, her death on the show, and even talked about
Gloucester Cathedral a little bit, as she was rumoured to have been filming
there a couple of weeks ago. She wasn’t, but she did go to a wedding there last
year. Faye was quick to smile, very witty, gave lots of eye contact, and even
winked at me as I was leaving. Given the queue behind me, it was the very best
I could have asked for. Total sweetheart of a woman. Even more surprisingly,
she was doing table pictures! Considering her queue length, that caught me off
guard. Even though I had a studio photo later in the day, I got a table picture
too as it never hurts to have a back-up. Both turned out brilliantly. Great
woman! Guest Type = Responder.

Anton
Lesser: Everyone seemed to have the same idea we did.
Start at Faye and work our way down the line of guests. Thankfully, as we were
near the front of Faye’s queue, we were also relatively near the front of Anton
and Sam’s queues too. I will freely admit that I knew little about Anton coming
into the event. I knew I loved him as Qyburn in “Game Of Thrones”, I knew that
somehow Qyburn had survived for four seasons and still isn’t dead (which is
something that Anton boasted to me about while cackling madly), and I knew that
Anton was a talented actor, but I knew little else about the man. In the few
minutes I had with him, I could tell that he was just like a kind, warm
grandfather. If I needed someone to read stories to my children one day, it
would be him. I know that Anton has done at least one convention before, but I
believe the experience is still relatively new to him, but that didn’t seem to
faze him during our conversation as he was talkative and engaging. Anton
expressed gratitude in Qyburn surviving for so long on the show as the longer
Qyburn survives, the more fun things like conventions that Anton will get to
do. If there was one word to sum up Anton in fact, I’d say ‘gratitude’. Anton
talked about the fun he had while filming with Lena Headey over the past couple
of years, he talked about Qyburn’s legitimate sorrow in being part of Grand
Maester Pycelle’s death (there was no ill will there, Pycelle was just in the
wrong place at the wrong time), and he talked about his dream end-game of
Qyburn ruling the Seven Kingdoms, only by that point there’d be nobody left to
rule, so the show would just end with Qyburn sitting on the Iron Throne,
grinning, as he looks out into an empty hall. It’s a long shot, granted, but I
love that he’s daydreamed about this. Much like Faye, I was surprised that
Anton was offering table pictures as his queue was also pretty big by this
point. Plus, he was only there for one day! Very cool that he was doing them.
Great guy, very interesting to talk to, and he portrays an interesting character
in “Game Of Thrones” too. Stupendous! Guest
Type = Responder.

Sam
Coleman: This was Sam’s first ever convention, yet you
wouldn’t know it by looking at him. Sam threw himself into the convention scene
head-first. He was wearing a ‘Hand of the King’ pin, he was talking away to
people, and you just knew he was
having the time of his life. All weekend he was telling people how blessed he
felt to have been a part of “Game Of Thrones” whenever someone asked him if he
was tired of people saying ‘hold the door’ yet. Incidentally, he’s also in the
new “Leatherface” film and has recently been touring as part of the ‘Magic of
the Musicals’ performances, so it’s great to see that a talented young man’s
career is taking off in such a big way. I love to see guests that get stuck in.
If you’re going to attend a convention, don’t be the deer in the headlights,
don’t keep your distance and look down at the 8” x 10” the whole time, be one
of us! Trust me, we’re really easy people to please. Sam was a big fan of “Game
Of Thrones” before getting the part, so when he got the call just to audition
for the show, he was ecstatic. That level of enthusiasm also earns you big
Shangel bonus points as it shows that you’re passionate about what you’re
doing. While Sam wasn’t around that much, the scenes he was a part of were very
important for Hodor, Bran, and the White Walkers, so the part that Sam played
was a great one to be offered if you’re going to be in a few episodes of the
show. When I first got to the table, Sam beamed that he loved my outfit,
particularly my bandana and tie. Bless him! In addition to our “Game Of
Thrones” discussion, Sam also mentioned some of the more challenging names he’d
had to write during his morning and was pleased that my name was just the standard
spelling of ‘Shane’. Sam came across as a very cool dude and like he wasn’t
nervous at all about attending his first convention. If he chose to attend
more, I’m sure people would take to him very quickly as he’s the type of
personality and guest people want to meet. Got a picture at the table too! Guest Type = Responder.

By
this point, Richard Brake and Joe Naufahu’s queues had started to fill up so
much that the crew were telling people to come back later, which was definitely
needed as the “Game Of Thrones” area was becoming one large crush. I think for
next year that all “Game of Thrones” cast members should be virtual queuing.
Even if they’re not that popular, there’s no harm done by making them a V.Q.
guest, whereas the alternative way around causes congestion. With Richard and
Joe tied up, Natalia not arriving until 11:00am (her band had a gig in northern
England the night before), and me trying to avoid Paul McGann until later in
the day (better chance of getting a table picture), my options were limited to
Elden Henson, Edge, or Jack Gleeson. As Jack and Edge were right next to each
other down the back of the hall where most of the ‘biggest’ guests sit, we
headed there next.

Jack
Gleeson: I love Jack. Two things were instantly apparent to me before I even got to the front of his
queue, just by listening to his conversations with other people...1)
Compliments make him awkward. He appreciated the compliments a great deal, but
they make him awkward because he doesn’t think he’s that good of an actor. He’s
clearly deluded by a lack of self-confidence because he was fantastic on “Game Of Thrones”. Truly
superb. 2) He has the personality of an excitable puppy at conventions. Also,
he dresses like a private-schooled preppy guy, which oddly makes me love him
more. Considering the size of Jack’s queue all day, I couldn’t help but be
impressed by him. He was offering table pictures, he shook everybody’s hand,
looked people in the eye, and even managed as much conversation as he could in
the timeframe available to each person. Also, Jack’s smile might be creepier
than his scowl. If you look at people’s studio photos with Jack from the event,
Jack smiles like a two year old that has just been told how to smile in photos
– chin up, teeth out, head slightly back. Once again, this only makes me love
him more. He’s got this aura of innocence about him that is so un-Joffrey like
that you can’t see any of Joffrey in
Jack’s real life personality. Probably for the best as Joffrey was a little
psychopath and all...I, of course, complimented Jack on his performance in the
show, especially as he made Joffrey so hateable, even before he ordered Ned’s
head removed and became a bonafide villain. He just has a very slappable face.
As many people know, Jack has largely retired from acting for the time being,
but he still does do some theatre work, as he’s set up his own theatre company
with 3 friends of his, the “Collapsing Horse Theatre Company”. I read in an
interview that Jack turned down Hollywood because he’s rather stay more close
to home and do something he truly loves, rather than head to Los Angeles and
have to fit into their mould. I told him how admirable that was too, as many
people would be and have been swayed by the bright lights and wealth that can
be attained in “Hollywood”, especially for someone who’s already established
and popular like Jack is. We continued to talk about “Game Of Thrones” and
conventions for a while before I thanked Jack for his time, he shook my hand,
thanked me in return, and we left. When you factor in queue size, this was an
awesome experience. I was thoroughly impressed with Jack. It seems as though
many of the bigger guests this year were even better than previous years, as
Jack, Mads, Edge, Michael Emerson, Jeremy Renner, Dolph Lundren, Tobin Bell,
and others who were wildly popular all seem to have received glowing reviews
since the event has finished. Guest Type
= Big Guest.

Edge: I
will openly admit that I’m a wrestling junkie and have been since I was three
years old (1992), watching Bret Hart and the British Bulldog go at it in the
Wembley Arena as part of “Summerslam 1992”. Since that day, my love of the
sport has never waned. However, while Bret Hart was my childhood hero (and I
still need to meet him!), the Attitude Era was when my love was at its
strongest. Guys like Triple H, The Rock, Steve Austin, Mankind, The Undertaker,
Kane, Chris Jericho, Eddie Guerrero, The Hardy Boyz, and Edge & Christian
helped cement my place as a diehard fan that simply had to watch everything that the WWF produced. Over the years, I’ve
had the opportunity to meet many of my wrestling heroes, and I’ve always found
that wrestlers, for the most part, are either all hit or all miss. Either they
talk to you for ages, are really appreciative, tell great stories, and leave
you feeling euphoric, or they bark “hi” at you, sign, bark “bye” at you, and
come across as being there for money and money alone. Thankfully, there’s been
more of the former than the latter, and wrestlers such as RVD, Chris Jericho,
DDP, Paul London, Bob Holly, the Dudley Boyz, Magnus, James Storm, and the
legendary Ricky Steamboat have all been phenomenal
human beings. However, all of the aforementioned may have just been
overtaken by Edge, who is arguably the most humble, kind, appreciative,
talkative wrestler I’ve ever met. His queue was slammed when we joined it and it was the longest queue of the
weekend for the amount of time it took to get to the front, partially because
Edge was popular and partially because he was talking to everybody for as long
as possible. He was a total class act. He was my favourite guest of the
weekend. When we got to the front of the queue, I mentioned to Edge that I’d
just finished re-reading his autobiography, which he wrote himself in 2002/2003
without a ghost writer. I asked him if he had any plans to write a follow-up as
obviously there is still a lot of story left to tell, the second half of his
wrestling career and his acting career being chief among them. Edge confided
that he actually did start writing a second autobiography not long after he
retired. He got about halfway through it, but then lost interest and that spark
to continue went out. He’s the type of guy where if he loses passion in
something, he’ll move on to something else, so the second book has fallen to
the curb for the time being, but he obviously still has half of it written if
he decided to do another one in the future. We joked that if Chris Jericho can
have three autobiographies and Mick Foley can have, like, thirteen, then Edge
is deserving of at least a trilogy himself. We also talked about the Winter
Death Tours he mentioned in his first book, where he and a bunch of other
wrestlers would drive to northern Canada in a van, in minus 70 degreesweather,
to wrestle in front of a couple hundred people at various Indian reservations.
Edge said that if he was asked to do one now, he’d say “are you crazy?!”, but back then it was the most amazing experience,
even when the ring van broke down one day and they were stuck outside in the
70-below-zero weather for an hour trying to get the ring van out of the lake it
had fallen in to (it went through the ice).

One
thing I love about Edge is that he comes across as so positive and thankful. He loved his wrestling career, he loves
his acting career, he loves his family, he loves his fans, and he loves life. He’s
always positive, always genuinely appreciative, and he never seems to stop
flashing those pearly white teeth. I also congratulated Edge on recently being
cast in the fifth season on “Vikings”, to which he was grateful. He said that
he started growing his hair again a few months ago, not out of necessity, but
because he couldn’t be bothered to cut it. He has a newborn child at home (with
former WWE female wrestler, Beth Phoenix) and has better things to do than
worry about his hair. I told him that it’d probably come in handy for “Vikings”
at the very least, to which Edge laughed loudly. Afterwards, the conversation
turned to comic books and superheroes, as Edge has been a huge fan of the genre
since he was a very young man and still collects certain comics to this day.
Edge has obviously appeared in “The Flash” as Atom-Smasher, but I asked him, in
a dream scenario, which superhero would he love to play? Edge said that
obviously characters like Iron Man are appealing, but keeping things in the
realms of possibility from his appearance standpoint, his first choice would be
Cable and his second choice would be Sabretooth. I’d love
to see Edge play Sabretooth. Apparently, an X-Men television series is
imminent, so why not have the gigantic Canadian play a version of Sabretooth if
everything falls into place? Those of us that have followed his wrestling
character know he’d be a perfect fit. Edge couldn’t think of anyone from D.C.
as he’s more of a Marvel guy. I said I was too, so we started talking about various
Marvel superheroes for a while. All in all, the conversation was significantly
longer than I was expecting for an LFCC event and it was easily my longest
conversation of the weekend, clocking in at well over 5 minutes. Not my fault,
people! Edge wanted to keep talking, even when the crew member was trying to
slide the next 8” x 10” to him. On top of all that awesomeness, he even took a
table picture with me too! £25 still feels like a bargain in this instance.
I’ve met people before that cost double the money and were half the experience.
I went into this as a huge fan and left as even more of one. Edge, and his
single moist tattoo (sorry, inside joke), totally reeked of awesomeness. Guest Type = Conversationalist.

Elden
Henson: After we left the back of the hall, we headed over
to Elden Henson. I showed the crew member my V.Q. number (#14), and he went to
check with the crew member sat next to Elden if it was okay, as Elden was just
going to lunch and his queue was therefore entirely empty for this reason. Upon
discovery of this information, I wanted to wait for him to return instead,
fearing that he wouldn’t be very talkative as he’d be hungry and just wanting
to get it over with to go and eat and relax for a little while. Elden told the
crew member it was fine, so we went over. Thankfully, all my fears were
unfounded, and I probably ended up talking to Elden for longer than I would
have otherwise because there was nobody behind me in the queue. It was totally
classy of Elden to not only see us before going to lunch (we’d have been
totally fine if he’d gone and we saw him later in the day), but to be so classy
and talkative, even knowing that rest and food were on the other side of our
conversation. Obviously, our conversation largely revolved around “Daredevil”
and the awesomeness that is Foggy. It’s refreshing to see that Foggy isn’t the
Robin to Daredevil’s Batman, but is instead a hero in his own right, in the
courtroom. Elden was thankful that Foggy not only had a backbone (not all
‘sidekicks’ do), but was also a three-dimensional character that wasn’t under
Daredevil’s shadow. We both agreed that the writing, the directing, the fight
sequences, and the acting on the Marvel Netflix shows has been second to none.
Having the showrunner of both seasons be two former “Buffy The Vampire Slayer”
writers doesn’t hurt either. Elden also told us that he was going to appear in
the Netflix crossover series, “The Defenders” too, which wasn’t officially announced until two days
after we met him. Naughty, Elden! But totally cool for us! Elden also talked
about the dramatic filming schedule he had for a while between filming “The
Hunger Games: Mockingjay” and “Daredevil” season two. In essence, he wrapped on
“The Hunger Games” on June 19th in Berlin, was in Los Angeles for
the birth of his child on June 20th (the day before my birthday!),
and was in New York 10 days later to start “Daredevil” season two. Talk about a
whirlwind fortnight. I told him that at least the lack of sleep from a newborn child
would help with Foggy’s storyline during the second season, to which he laughed
loudly. We talked for a further minute about “Daredevil”, he offered a table
picture, which was awesome as I didn’t think he’d be doing them, and then we
both left at the same time. Us to go and find other guests, him to go and eat.
Awesome experience. Guest Type =
Conversationalist.

6
down, 4 to go.

Joe
Naufahu: It was 11:00am by this point, but Natalia was still
not at her autograph table, so we decided to head to the back of Joe Naufahu’s
line. Joe, unlike everyone else I met over the weekend, was standing with us on
the peasant side of the autograph table. He was stood up with us, talking to us
with our faces on the same level. Totally classy move on his part as it meant
there was no barrier between us and him, no autograph table. Not only was Joe
totally classy in that regard, but damn it if he wasn’t the friendliest man! Joe
is a native New Zealander, so he has that wonderful accent. We talked about his
time on “Game Of Thrones”, as he was a big fan of the show before being cast.
He said that he wasn’t “this big of a fan” (he pointed around the convention),
but he did love the show. He expressed awe in how passionate and caring the fan
base for the show was, with many people at the convention dressed up as various
characters, etc. I believe this was Joe’s first convention (I could be wrong)
and he had that look of someone who was in Disneyland. It’s quite amusing that
to non-convention attendees, conventions have a certain stigma. A stigma of
nothing but middle-aged nerds in Star Trek t-shirts that are too small for
them, making the annual trek out of their parents’ basement to meet some
actors. That’s not the case at all! Okay,
perhaps just a smidge, but it’s largely a group of like-minded individuals that
are passionate about the same thing. That care enough about their passions to
dress up, queue for hours, and interact with their heroes. I wish there was
more love like that in the world. Hugh Laurie echoed all of these sentiments on
“The Graham Norton Show” a year or so ago too. Joe also told us about the
pranks he and Emilia used to play on each other on set. For instance, Joe fell
asleep in the green room after one particular scene, so Emilia snuck in and
dripped caramel fudge all over him. He didn’t wake up until she put the spoon
in his mouth! Another time, Emilia also scribbled Dothraki words on his arms
while he slept. It makes me so happy to know they all get on so well behind the
cameras too. The conversation also turned to Mixed Martial Arts, as Joe
recently shared a picture of him with the UFC President, Dana White. We talked
about the imminent Nate Diaz vs. Conor McGregor 2 fight (we’re both rooting for
Nate), and we expressed our opinions on their first fight. I shared that for
the first time in my life, I bet on something. I bet on Nate to beat Conor in
their first fight. I put £20 on and got £400 back after Nate submitted
McGregor. Thanks, Nate! Joe was fucking awesome. Hilarious, interesting,
talkative, and I’d happily meet him again. Picture with him at the autograph
table too! Totally worth the £15. Guest
Type = Conversationalist.

Richard
Brake: Right after we finished with Joe, we jumped one
place to our right and queued up for Richard Brake, who played the Night King
during the fourth and fifth seasons of “Game Of Thrones” (a scheduling conflict
meant that he was unable to reprise the role in the sixth season), including
the incredible “Hardhome” episode. Richard
talked about the fun process of getting all the prosthetics and make-up on (5
hours!) and what it was like to play a character that you could largely only
use your body and eyes to convey thoughts and emotion with. He filmed his
scenes in a studio and also in Belfast, but has yet to film in Iceland, where a
large section of the Wall (and north of the Wall) scenes have been filmed. When
it came to whether he’d be able to return (as the role was recast for season
six due to the scheduling conflict), he said “never say never” and winked. I’m
not sure if that means he’s coming back for season seven, but I would assume
that he’s definitely in the running. He said that filming “Hardhome” in
particular was a great pleasure and he knew the episode was going to be a
massive hit after he filmed the scene where he walks down the pier on the
shorefront and raises the dead with his arms. It was certainly an iconic
moment. Richard came across as a warm and interesting man, I grabbed a picture
with him and the autograph table, and then it was time to chill for the
briefest of moments before Natalia Tena arrived. Guest Type = Responder.

Natalia
Tena: Sweet Natalia. Coming into the event, I knew that
my time with some guests would be limited due to the amount of people that
wanted to meet them. I knew anything above a minute or two with Jack was
unlikely. I knew anything above a minute or two with Elden was unlikely (I got
longer!). I knew anything above a minute of two with Edge was unlikely (I got
way longer!). However, as we entered Natalia’s queue just as she was arriving,
with 10 or so people in front of us, I felt strangely optimistic. The more I
read about her, the more similar I find us. Plus, all my friends that have met her
have said the same thing – sweet, crazy, potentially tipsy. When we got to the
front of the queue, I handed over the Tonks art print I’d purchased the
previous day, as well as getting an Osha 8” x 10” signed, her character from
“Game Of Thrones”. Natalia mentioned that she’d never seen the Tonks art print
before, so I explained that the dude from the stall’s daughter had drawn it and
then made 25 copies. I thanked Natalia for coming, and I told her that I’d been
following her career for a long time, with “About A Boy” in my pre-teens,
“Harry Potter” in my teens and early 20’s, and “Game Of Thrones” in my early
and mid-20’s. It’s pretty cool that Natalia’s career has allowed her to remain
a part of a generation of people’s lives throughout. Natalia was pleased by
this and loved the fact that she’d gotten to, in a way, watch a generation of
people grow up, as she started attending conventions many years ago and has
seen some repeat attendees grow from children to adults. That’s wonderful.
Natalia told us that she was “fucking knackered!” because she’d been performing
a gig the night before in the Lake District, driven to London, “the M6 wouldn’t
end!”, and she hadn’t gotten here until the very early hours of Saturday
morning so she was running off of almost no sleep...then she noticed my tattoo
on my right forearm and got very interested (she has tattoos herself). She
asked for the story behind it, so I explained. Wrestling, logo with best
friend, best friend died, got it as tribute. Natalia seemed genuinely concerned
regarding the death and asked if I was dealing okay. I said I was as it was a
long time ago. When she was sure I was okay talking about it, she got excited
about the fact I used to be a wrestler! She asked questions about it, asked if
I was still doing it (nope, no fun after my friend died), and said, “well,
fuck, that’s still something cool for the C.V., ‘I was a wrestler!’...fucking
awesome”. I told her that I loved her band, Molotov Jukebox, and that I’d
likely be seeing her at their show in Cambridge in September, to which she
squee’d loudly, yelled, and threw her hands up in the air in celebration. She
told me if I go, I have to go find her. Awesome. I also told her I saw their
new music video, “If I Knew”, when drunk a few weeks back and it tripped me
out. She laughed and said that she’s not sure how she feels about the music
video, but she loves that it’s such a mind-trip. I thanked her for coming, she
stood up to hug me, and we left. Guest
Type = Conversationalist. Loved meeting her! After she cancelled on LFCC
last year, I was left feeling so dejected, so it was amazing to not only meet
her this time, but to have her be such a cool person was awesome.

With
9 great experiences in a row under my belt, it was time to start my afternoon
of photoshoots. As before, there’s so little to talk about with the photoshoots
that I’ll just give you a few notes and nothing more. All 6 went off without a
hitch, relatively on time. Faye’s was quick, easy, she remembered me from
earlier in the morning, and gave me a hug after the photo was taken. The
queuing for the ‘Hold The Door’ group photo and the Jack Gleeson/Iron Throne
photo was a mess, simply because it was out in the open, so people kept
stopping in or next to the queues to gawk and take pictures, leaving the whole
area crowded and confusing. No matter, both photos started relatively on time (both a little late, but not late enough to
cause issues) and both turned out pretty great too. For the ‘Hold The Door’
group photo, I asked everyone if they could look scared. After all, we know
what’s on the other side of that door, right? Ellie really went for it, Kae
tried bless her, and Kristian looks as though he’d pushed a fart out and
followed through. I love it. The Jack/Iron Throne picture was a bit more
awkward, simply because you have two people and one seat, so I didn’t really
know what to do for it. It turned out okay, though. Not great, but good enough.
After the picture was taken, Jack switched seats with me and sat on my lap
though, so I can’t complain too much. I still love that Jack smiles like a
little boy that’s just learned how to smile when a camera is aiming at them.
It’s so child-like!

Jeremy
Renner was a huge hit with me and
pretty much everyone else. He really threw himself into the occasion.I think as Jeremy was pretty much 40 when he
became a household name, there must have been times where he wondered if he’d
ever make it to the A-Lister he is today. Therefore, I think he’s more
appreciative than most for it now. If you wanted a hug picture, fine with him.
An action shot, also fine. He’d hold props you brought for the shoot, he’d wrap
his arms around you, he’d shake everyone’s hand when they approached, he’d
smile and laugh...he was awesome, and he came across like he was having the
time of his life. When it was my turn, he threw his arm over my shoulders,
pulled me in close to him, the photo was taken, and he even had time to chat to
me a little bit, shake my hand, and thank me before I left. Total class act. Meet him if you get the
chance. He’s worth the money. Not all big guests are, but he is. My Edge and
Anton Lesser photos ran smoothly and came out great too. Edge never stopped
smiling the whole shoot, which must be challenging after the first 300 photos,
surely? My cheeks would ache.

By
this point, it was 5:30pm. We were exhausted, but gleeful. I’d accomplished
everything I’d wanted to accomplish on that day. I thought some of it was
likely to bounce over to Sunday, making Sunday harder, but everything went my
way...it was just Paul McGann’s autograph left.

Paul
McGann: When we approached Paul’s autograph table, fate
was not on my side. He still had a “no posed photos” sign up, but there was
just one person talking to him (a friend of his) and no queue behind, so I
discretely asked Paul’s crew member if I got an autograph from Paul, would it
be okay to get a picture too? As the sign was up, it was only right to ask the
crew beforehand. The lovely crew member said it was totally fine and that the
sign was only there because of Paul’s huge queue earlier in the day, it wasn’t
because Paul didn’t want to do them or anything like that. To be fair, his
queue earlier in the day was barbaric so it was totally fair. Woohoo! I could
get my picture! I’ve had the opportunity to meet four of the Doctors from the
classic era of “Doctor Who” now and all four have been wonderful, but Paul is
my very favourite. He’s such a classy, talkative, genuine individual. Also, he
doesn’t own a TV. I borrowed a quote from Joey from “Friends” and asked what
all his living room furniture points towards if he doesn’t own a TV, which got
a big laugh. I told him how much I loved finally
getting to see his regeneration scene in “The Night Of The Doctor” as part of
the 50th anniversary special. He said even though he’s done many,
many audio dramas as the Doctor since the 1996 movie, he loved coming back to
play the Doctor on television again. He had a blast recording his scenes, he
was overwhelmed to be part of the 50th anniversary special, and he
told me it was such an honour to regenerate into John Hurt, as John Hurt was
his childhood hero and one of the primary reasons he became an actor in the
first place. He told John Hurt all this too. I love that Paul McGann is a
“Doctor Who” fanboy too. Most of the actors that have played the Doctor were huge fans already, which is wonderful.
We also talked about the process of recording the “Doctor Who” audio dramas and
how they compare to recording his voiceovers for “Eden”, a reality television
show that has just started, where 23 people are dumped in a remote coastal area
of Scotland with a few supplies and are told to survive there for one year as a
community. Paul was very charming and gracious throughout our conversation,
even though he must have been exhausted from his massive queue all day. The
picture was taken, I thanked him immensely, and we headed back to the Premier
Inn, exhausted but thoroughly satisfied. Guest
Type = Conversationalist.

What
a day. Suffice to say, we were all in bed half-dead by 9pm and faced a terrible
dilemma – “Iron Man 2” was playing on one channel, while “Batman: The Dark
Knight” was playing on another. While “The Dark Knight” is a better film, we
decided on “Iron Man 2” because it’s funnier and we needed some happiness.
Sadly, due to Donald Sumpter being a Sunday only guest, we had to get up at 5am
again the following day. I had 9 photos ahead of me, but just one autograph. It
was going to be a relatively easy day in comparison to the previous one, but I
knew Donald would be popular as I believe it was his first convention, plus he
was only there for two-thirds of one day, so I wanted to get there early to
ensure I got a low virtual queuing number. I ultimately received #35. Easy.

As
before, photos are pretty easy and relatively uninteresting from a reviewing
perspective so I’ll just mention a few things. My first photo of the day was
Jack Gleeson’s regular, non-Iron Throne shoot. He still smiled like a little
boy and was his usual courteous self. Right after Jack in photo area C was
Gemma Whelan, closely followed by Dan Portman. I’ve met both of these lovely
people before, but I wanted a better photo with both of them. Gemma remembered
me from last year and enthusiastically greeted me, while Dan not only
remembered me from 18 months ago, but remembered our conversation as he started
talking to me about wrestling right after the picture was taken, much to the
chagrin of the photographer, I’m sure. Loved Dan for remembering me and our
conversation from so long ago. Especially considering he does so many
conventions and meets so many people. Both photos turned out really good too!
Much better than my previous photos with them. After these 3 photos, it was
time for an hour’s break before my next two with Michelle Gomez and Natalia
Tena, both taking place in photo area B, so I took this opportunity to get my
one autograph of the day, Donald Sumpter.

Donald
Sumpter: Donald was, as expected, very busy. We were told
his line was closed to allow it to go down for 5-10 minutes. I lingered close
to the line, but not in the way, waiting for it to re-open. When it did, I was
straight in there! As my schedule was so tight on Sunday already (or it would
have been if I hadn’t been so efficient on Saturday and gotten my Laurie photo
on Friday instead), I didn’t want to risk missing out on Donald’s autograph,
especially as it was his first convention and I didn’t know if he’d ever do
another one. Donald was more talkative than expected given his queue and he
really came across as a loving grandfather. If I could choose a celebrity
grandfather, Donald would likely top that list. Or Ian McElhinney. The people
in front of us got Donald to sign a picture of him from “Spooks”, where I
believe he’s tied up and bloody. When we got to the front, Donald remarked that
it was an odd choice of picture to get signed and had a little chuckle to
himself about it, which worked as a terrific ice-breaker. Donald also picked up
a picture of him as an officer from the 1960’s and told us that all actors had
to have that haircut when they placed officers during that era, before he
remarked that the haircut made everyone, including him, look like an idiot. I
laughed so hard. Not only is he talkative and charming, but he’s
self-deprecating too. My kind of guy! The conversation then transitioned to,
you guessed it, “Game Of Thrones”, where we talked about Maester Luwin being a
beacon of light and goodness in a show that prides itself on villains and
grey-area characters. Donald enforced what a wonderful time he had while
filming the show, before we turned our attention to “Doctor Who”. Donald is one
of few actors to appear on both the black-and-white and colour versions of the
show, having almost 50 years between his first and most recent appearances.
That’s one helluva résumé! I thanked him immensely for his generosity and time,
and even managed to get an unexpected table picture with him, where he rested
his head against mine, like the celebrity grandfather I wanted him to be. Oh,
sweet summer child. For those of you keeping score, out of the 16 autograph
table conversations I had over LFCC weekend, 15 were awesome and 1 was awkward.
That’s a decent statistic. Guest Type = Responder.

The
Michelle Gomez photoshoot was hilarious, as Michelle kept spontaneously
choosing random poses and expressions for her photos. She was clearly having a
great time, pulling her Missy face and wearing cat ears. I wish I’d gotten her
autograph now too as she seemed like a right laugh! No matter, the photo turned
out well. Natalia remembered me from the previous day, gave me a big hug again,
the picture was taken, and she said she’d hopefully see me in September.
Awesome woman! Due to my being so efficient over the previous two days, I found
myself with nothing to do for an hour or so after Natalia’s photoshoot, so we
decided to check out the merchandise stalls while waiting for my friend Rhi to
arrive to the venue. Rhi was caught up in so much traffic that she didn’t
arrive until well after 3pm, at which point we were both caught up in
photoshoots all afternoon so I ended up literally missing her by 60 seconds.
Typical. By this point, it was 3pm on Sunday, we were all weary, tired, and
ready to be heading home, but I had 4 photoshoots left. This sentiment seemed
to be echoed by many, as most people in the photoshoot queues were talking
longingly of sitting down and getting a good night’s sleep. If you’ve never
been to a big weekend convention like LFCC, don’t underestimate how tired it’ll
leave you afterwards. 3 days of adrenaline peaks and falls, of queuing for
hours and hours, of meeting heroes, of walking further than you’ve realised,
and socialising with so many people will leave you feeling drained and achy for
days afterwards.

The
afternoon photoshoots went as smoothly as they possibly could, with Dominic
Monaghan being the life of the party and requesting some better music be played
before the photos began. He danced between photos and was clearly having a
great time. Elden Henson’s photoshoot went smoothly too and was also Hannah’s
one and only photoshoot of the weekend, my 23rd birthday present to
her the previous month. Right after Elden was Donald Sumpter, who was much more
hands-on than expected, hugging people, throwing his arm over people’s
shoulders, and generally being the great sport that he is. After Donald, my
final photoshoot of the day and weekend, was Famke Janssen, Jean Grey from the
“X-Men” franchise. Out of everything I’ve been told and read since the event,
Famke was a bit of a nightmare. While 10% of people had good autograph table
experiences, the other 90% left feeling dejected and disappointed. She barely
looked up, barely spoke, and many people thought she was cold. I didn’t get her
autograph and I can’t speak for other people, so I’ll just give my opinion. Famke
had a “no touching” policy for her photoshoot and she was sat down on a stool
for it. Evidently, she had broken ribs, so the no touching and sitting down was
totally fine with me. I’ve broken my ribs before and the pain of clothing
touching them can sometimes be agony so the last thing you want is people
hugging your ribs all weekend. That is perfectly understandable and excusable.
What I can’t excuse, however, was the lack of interest or manners. I managed to
get a “hi” in response to mine when it was time for my photo (some people
didn’t), but she didn’t look at me, barely smiled in the photo (same with
everyone else’s too), and didn’t respond to my “thank you” when I left.
Instead, her bodyguard thanked me. Broken ribs don’t stop you from thanking
your fans or gently turning your head to briefly look at them. Sorry, I’ve had
the same injury, it simply doesn’t excuse the behaviour. Plus, Famke has done
one convention before this one, where she was broken rib-free, and the
impression from the attendees was similar to this event, so I don’t think the
ribs can be used as an excuse. Some people paid hundreds of pounds for a
diamond pass with her, only to barely get acknowledged. I’d be furious. As it
is, I’m pretty furious that I spent £45(!) to get a photo with her where she
looks somewhat like a waxwork. Hilariously, mine is one of the better photos
I’ve seen with her from the weekend! At least there’s no gap and she’s somewhat
smiling! The experience did and still does leave a bit of a sour taste in my
mouth. In comparison, the other X-Men guest of the weekend I met, Aaron
Stanford, was a fucking legend. The thing is, 99% of us convention attendees
are easy to make happy! Acknowledge our presence, look remotely interested in
meeting us and being there, say “hi” and “thank you”, and smile a little bit,
and we’ll be fans for life! It’s so easy to give us a good time and a lifelong
memory! Plus, let’s not forget, no fans = no career.

Now
that my little rant is over, I’ve got to mention one or two other things, then
it’s time to wrap up this 22-page review (and counting), excluding pictures.
Gosh, I love the sound of my own voice, clearly. I saw my “Wales Comic Con” alumni
Kim and Charley just before my Famke photoshoot, and Charley was practically a
puddle on the floor as she was about to go and meet Edge. She’d had a photo
with him the previous day and already turned into a pile of fangirling goo.
Don’t believe me? Look...

Sorry,
Charley. I couldn’t complete this review without putting that adorably
hilarious video in here somewhere. It’d be an injustice. Charley has been a
huge fan of Edge for practically 20 years, just like I have, so I can understand
the fangasms, and honestly it’s pretty refreshing to see someone so
uninhibited. After talking to Charley and Kim for a while, and laughing
hysterically at Charley’s face when I mentioned that Edge was taking table
pictures and talking to people for a long time, it was basically time to leave
the event for the weekend. A weekend of great memories, wonderful experiences,
blissful conversations, and decent photos. Could the experience be improved?
Certainly. There’s still some tweaks that need to happen. However, overall,
this was a vast improvement over the previous two years. If you remember how
big LFCC is and plan accordingly, and remember that you time with the guests
might be more limited than other events, then there’s no reason you can’t have
a great time. This was my 6th straight LFCC and I’ll definitely be
back next year for my 7th. While “Wales Comic Con” still holds the
title of best conventions in the U.K. and will likely to continue to do so for
many years, I was impressed with LFCC this year and the improvements they’ve
made since the 2015 edition.

Some
other really cool stuff happened over the weekend too, but nothing I can talk
about publicly. If you see me around at other events, feel free to come over
and say “hi” and ask me about them. I’m happy to chat with anyone! I’ll be at
“Worcester Comic Con” in a few weeks, Showmasters’ “Bournemouth Comic Con” in
early September, my home-city’s “Gloucester Comic Con” in early October, “Wales
Comic Con” in Wrexham on the 5th and 6th of November, and
Starfury’s “Vampire Ball 7” in early December. If you see me around, feel free
to come say “hi”. I don’t bite that hard. As always, over LFCC weekend, I saw
many friends, made some new ones, and had over 50 people come to talk to me
about the blog. I try not to name too many people in the review itself as I
fear I’ll miss someone out and offend them. So, thank you all for your time at LFCC if we spoke and thank you for helping to
create new lifelong memories with me. I also saw some of the Showmasters forum
members lingering around the event too, which was cool. Of course, I chatted to
my friend, Mr. David Bedwell and got a selfie with him at his insistence. I
queued up right next to PenThePirate on Saturday morning, but didn’t realise it
was him until the next day. I saw Wrong Name around the venue numerous times
over the weekend. I saw Faerie Tanith a bunch of times too, but didn’t know it
was her until afterwards, and I even spotted a camel (sorry, forum joke). While
I don’t post too often on the forums, I’m constantly on them reading about the
latest guest announcement or shenanigans from the weekend, so it was cool to
see so many of you in real life too. As at the start of this review, thanks to
the crew for making the event all the more smooth and enjoyable, and thank you
to everyone who took the time to read this as-always astronomical review.

7 comments:

Fantastic review as always. I was determined not to go back to London after last year, but your review matches my friends thoughts so I think I'll give them another shot. Loved the pizza express thoughts of asking the waitress for an autograph, I always come away from the events wanting to chat to random people behind a counter

I love reading your reviews. I met Jack in Dallas a few months ago and you are right, he is a delight. His table was next to John Cusack's (who hadn't arrived yet) and I had a Cusack button on my backpack. Jack asked me about it and we ended up having a convo about Cusack movies. And the way you describe his smile is spot on. As I'm in the States and will probably never meet you, I have to admit my curiosity is piqued by the other cool things you can't mention!